Vizu: 64% of advertisers plan paid social media ad spend rise

Social media is no longer a free ride for marketers. According to Vizu's recent survey of more than 500 ad agencies and advertisers, almost two-thirds (64%) plan to increase their spending on paid social advertising.

Most of the advertisers surveyed by Vizu - 89% - are engaged in non-paid social media marketing activities such as Pages, posts, Pins and Likes. Among agencies that figure is 71%. But a large number, three-quarters of advertisers and 81% of agencies, are also paying to advertise on social media such as Facebook and Twitter.

Vizu found that 64% of advertisers plan to spend more on social media in the future. Forty-one percent expect budgets to rise by between 1% and 10% while 11% expect to see a rise of 21%+.

Not all advertisers currently have a paid social media ad budget.

According to Nielsen's blog post on the survey, "Currently, only 41% of advertisers report having a dedicated paid social media ad budget. To fund the increase in paid social media advertising activity, the majority plan to pull budget from other channels - both on and offline".

Thirty-nine percent of advertisers said budget would be pulled from offline channels while 23% said online display and 10% from other online channels.